Hello all. Does anyone have any insight or advice on working for any of the SE ship assist companies? Seabulk, crescent, bisso, g&h, etc?
In the Mississippi River you have 4 companies: Crescent, EN Bisso, Willie Bisso and Moran. Crescent is the largest and actually Moran has the smallest presence here. I personally would look at EN Bisso or Willie Bisso, both are solid. Most work 7 on/ 7 off but I know a few that do 14/14 or work over. They all have been staying busy with the prolonged high river stages. Now the river is down but they are all working and thriving. Most captains in the river stay for a long time and it is common to see people with 30+ years at a single company but if you can get on, it’s a gravy job. I only know these companies in the river and can’t speak for ship assist elsewhere.
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Thank you @DirtyCoast. Much appreciated
Seabulk is also 7/7 but you’ll probably have to live local (within 4 hours) for any company with that rotation. You’ll also spend an eternity waiting for a wheelhouse opportunity. Just food for thought
G&H is 4 and 4 for Houston/Galveston/Freeport/Texas City
7 and 7 for Corpus Christi
Houston is very turn and burn, while Corpus has little stints of either being steady, slow or turn and burn.
Houston guys MOSTLY live local while Corpus has a mix of local and out of state.
Here’s the rundown from West to East for harbor tug work.
Brownsville - Signet owns it
Corpus - G&H owns the ship work, Signet owns the oil and gas work, Chouest has the LNG plant work.
Matagorda/Point Comfort - Harbor Towing owns it.
Freeport - G&H owns it.
Houston/Galveston/Texas City - G&H owns it.
Port Arthur - Moran and Seabulk compete for the work.
Lake Charles- Moran/G&H own the LNG work, Harbor Towing and Seabulk compete for the ship work uptown.
Nola/River - EN Bisso, Bisso Towboat, Crescent, Moran all compete for the work.
Gulfport - Can’t remember…
Pascagoula - Signet owns it.
Mobile - Seabulk owns it.
Pensacola - Can’t remember…
Tampa - Seabulk and Independant compete for the work.
May have missed a few but that’s my recollection. If you want to get into it, find where you want to live first, then go for the company that operates there. Flying in and out for ship assist work sucks in the long term…also as someone mentioned before, it will take you a damn long time to move up, as these are generally lifetime jobs with people spending decades there.
You won’t make as much as you would working offshore/deep sea/lakes and you gotta be good at your job. No Facebook/button-mashing watches in that line of work.
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Wow, times have changed. I recall when St. Phillips was the company in Tampa. There was an upstart in the 80s, Taurus, but they didn’t last very long. I don’t see Port Everglades on the list, but I assume that Seabulk owns it, as they had in the past. Miami? That used to be Belcher, but not sure now. . .
I figured I’d stop at Tampa. Give some others the chance to do the rundowns for East and West Coast.
The East coast is almost exclusively Moran and McAllister with very few exceptions. Usually it’s both in each port competing against each other.
Gotcha.
Believe there is the one small company that runs Port Canaveral. Can’t remember the name.
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What about Vane? They seem to run a few boats on the East Coast.
They don’t do any ship assist.
Crescent competes against Moran in Savannah.
It was Petchem but E.N. Bisso bought it.
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Yeah there’s a few boats that do exclusively bunker work.
Various west coast ports ship assist from seattle to san diego crowley, foss, amnav, brusco, shaver, millennium (harley), starlight (harley), bay delta. Mostly union jobs that are hard to break into and pay fairly well…especially in comparison to what i have heard of pay at a lot of gulf coast companies doing the same work.
ECO has ship assist with the navy in san diego exclusively.
Bunker work is mostly handled by foss, west oil, OTB, Vane. There are a handful of small outfits that do bunkering as well.
Good info.
I know G&H is SIU.
I heard Crescent is union as well? In general the SE assist companies are not.